


Harrow

by CinderPoppy (salamanderssmile)



Category: League of Legends
Genre: Angst, M/M, Nightmares, Zed is an angsty shit for 500 words that's it that's all
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-17
Updated: 2018-04-17
Packaged: 2019-04-24 00:39:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 534
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14344311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/salamanderssmile/pseuds/CinderPoppy
Summary: Zed woke up with a start. A nightmare.





	Harrow

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ShimadaGenji](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShimadaGenji/gifts).



Zed woke up with a start. A nightmare. He was used to nightmares. They had accompanied him ever since he opened the box. But this one was different. It was not slick, oily shadows slithering through his mind and entwining with his spirit. It was a simple, actual nightmare. He sat up from where he laid, shaking his head. It had been a long, long time since he was subjected to one of those. It wouldn't even have been a nightmare at all, were it not for one key component to the cocktail: Shen. And how Zed hated him, his stupid ways, his tepid traditions. And how Zed hated himself for still loving him dearly. But he did. Unavoidably, he did. Because what was the point of simplicity when one danced on the shadow’s edge?

Zed stood up, and his mind was filled with lingering fear. Images of Shen broken, bruised, and bloodied under a demon or another. The shadows, himself, darting from place to place to watch the massacre, his rival finally meeting his match, just as he had always predicted; tradition, the cadaver of wisdom. But there was no satisfaction in the deed, no warmth of the simple pleasure of being right. Only harrowing,  _ hollowing _ pain. Because Shen couldn't, shouldn't die like that. Shen should die at his hands and… No. He shouldn't die at all. Zed shook his head once more, padding barefoot to the basin full of water in the corner of the room. He splashed his face, but instead of chasing away the dredges of the nightmare with blissful emptiness, the water opened a flood of memories.

Shen, smiling with missing teeth under the shade of a tree as Zed approached. They were barely teenagers, and yet they trained every day. Shen, impassive and serious before an injury much worse than the usual. Shen, laughing away as Zed mercilessly tickled him. Shen, soft and warm and gorgeous as they huddled together to sleep. Shen, Shen, Shen… Zed’s mind was filled with the other ninja, It displeased him, it warmed him, in an uncomfortable balance of good and bad that gave him the beginnings of a headache.

Zed hated it. Hated how sometimes - the few times their paths crossed - Shen’s very sight had his heart fluttering. Not to mention others, more indecent reactions. He hated it because he hated Shen, as much as he hated the doomed path the other ninja insisted on following. He hated it because he still loved Shen, dearly. And every memory of their entangling fingers and shy, too young kisses brought to him at the same time a bitter taste to his mouth and a sweet warmth to his chest. Sometimes, Zed longed to go back in time, stop it, freeze it during those better days. Those times were of unbelievable, disgusting weakness. Dwelling in the past was for the weak and pathetic. Zed liked to think himself neither. So he took a deep breath and shook his head once more, focusing on the welcoming, slithering shadows he had come to know so intimately.

One thought remained, curled sweetly around the oily black tendrils. A wandering of his mind. Did Shen ever feel the same?


End file.
